Yes, we are back with another installment of my junkyard chronicles. And today, we feature a guest that squeaks in just over our informal (informal to the point of often being ignored) twenty-year cut-off. It also almost didn’t make the cut as I walked past it several times before noticing it’s not just another run of the mill Baby-Fish-Mouth Taurus, that least desired generation that pretty much ruined everything by dint of its polarizing looks. No, while this Taurus is sporting the plainest of wrappers, it does have those three magic initials on its rump: S H O

Of course there is much more to the SHO than just the name, originally standing for Super High Output; the first generation sported a powerful V-6 built by Yamaha, was only available with a stick shift, had a slight bodykit and distinctive alloy wheels with a sumptuous (for a Ford) interior and became a bit of an ’80’s legend, then the second generation carried on into the 90’s and offered an automatic as well from 1993 on. So after those first two generations of that Taurus, it was obvious that there needed to be an SHO for the third generation as well, but this time things were dialed up even more. Sort of.

Yes, this generation sported a V8! The only V8 ever in a Taurus for that matter. The engine was still built by Yamaha, but this time the aluminum block was manufactured by Ford using a method patented by Cosworth in their Windsor, Ontario, plant. The bare blocks were then shipped to Yamaha in Japan and then shipped back as complete engines for installation in Atlanta for something of a true international effort and likely great expense. I’ve never understood why nobody at Ford was capable of assembling the engine even if Yamaha did develop the aluminum heads, it certainly wasn’t intended to be an extremely low volume powerplant but I suppose if nothing else, it adds to the “magic”.

The engine, displacing 3.4l and distantly related to the Duratec 25, produced 235hp and 230lb-ft of torque, featuring 32 valves and a DOHC design. The transmission (the only transmission) was the Ford AX4N 4-speed automatic unit. Yes, sadly no manual was available with the V8, which probably didn’t help sales, the Europeans still offered stick shifts for most of their performance cars back then, an automatic would likely not be a consideration for many of those buyers that Ford was hoping to sway.

And a looker the engine is. Barring the fact of the transverse installation, that’s a very attractive presentation and obviously helped sell the car. I remember being at the Monterey Historics in 1995 where Ford brought a new 1996 SHO out of a trailer and started it up for the crowd, it made a lovely sound. That one was a metallic red, and while a pretty color, didn’t look very different from a normal Taurus with the exception of the rear spoiler, my friends and I were thinking it looked a little odd and was perhaps too subtle about its performance pedigree.

Nevertheless, here we are now with this 1999 model, the last year of production for this generation, finished in Vibrant White, an oxymoron if I’ve ever seen one. Sales of the SHO peaked around 9,000 units in 1997 but by 1999 had dwindled to around 3,300 for a take rate of quite a bit less than 1% of overall Taurus sales that year. On the plus side, likely none were fleet.

From the front, there really isn’t anything to distinguish it, the bumper is perhaps slightly different, likely at the bottom, and the side has a slight little skirt hanging down (Note the newer Taurus to the right for a good view of what changed for 2000). The wheels are 16″ aluminum alloys, and the tires were a meaty for the day 225/55-ZR16. So far this all looks correct, I wonder what stopped the SHO?

I was a little taken aback when I opened the door, sure it’s fairly clean and not trashed, but it’s so…sterile. If Euro-stark is what they were going for, then the Medium Graphite interior color missed the mark. It’s just so gray! And plasticky. Not just the leather (and they are leather seats as well as of a different, more bolstered design than the run of the mill models), but also everything else. Yes I know it’s built on the same line as the rental-spec Taurus, but there could (should) be a little more pizzazz. The other interior color option was Medium Prairie Tan, but the Denim Blue for example was not offered.

Wow! I looked at this, blinked, and stepped back out. Then I rubbed my eyes and looked again. SHO-nuff, that is 360,988 miles. I’d be impressed with that out of a regular Taurus, but especially an SHO. This is one of the highest mileages that I’ve seen in these junkyards, but I don’t look into most cars. These cars did have camshaft issues that could ruin an engine, but most of those were at significantly lower miles, and even if that was the problem, at this mileage it’d be hard to complain. Another possibility would be the timing chain, also not unknown to have issues in these cars and with that mileage even it had been changed/serviced it wouldn’t be a stretch to imagine.

It’s twenty years old, which makes for an average of 18,000 per year, and it’s in Wyoming, so that’s not implausible at all, it’s likely most miles were long steady-state highway miles, it doesn’t give the impression of being a multi-owner car either. At least there’s no blanks on the gauge faces, but for a performance car they could have added a couple more, no?

It’s got that sort of weird oval-theme stereo and HVAC combo panel, and the passenger has vents that seem to sit in their lap. I just can’t get over how drab this looks, sorry, for a car that cost $29,115 (equivalent to $44,871 in 2019 dollars).

The back seat is positively taxi-spec although at least there are two map pockets as well as HVAC vents. And I guess I can’t complain about the durability, actually this is probably the best Ford leather I’ve seen in some time as far as durability goes, usually it’s cracked and worn-looking within about five years, let alone twenty and this many miles.

The trunk space is decently spacious, and the rear seats fold down. This one was a bit of a mess, and no longer latched, likely due to the junkyard personnel and protocol, thus all the pictures are with it open. I was too lazy to lift something heavy onto it. Mustn’t scratch the paint, etc.

I still remember when this front end first saw the light of day. It wasn’t a happy day. And it hasn’t really gotten better with time either. In fact I recall this actually coming up in conversation with people at the office, and we weren’t really a car-talking group at that time either, but this, this was worthy of general conversation. At least it got the Taurus noticed, but not necessarily in a good way. The midcycle significant refresh did wonders for it, if it had been originally offered with the looks of the 2000 year model, I don’t think it would have suffered the way it did and the later Fusion may even have been named the Taurus all along.

What else? Well, let’s see, here’s the VIN tag showing it was built in May of 1999, which is right at the end of the line for this car as the last 3rd gen Taurus SHO was built on June 18, 1999, a month and maybe 250 cars later.

That reminds me, no power antenna on the SHO either. But someone took the regular one from this one. So far no takers for the alloys or the engine, although that’d be quite a gamble. This may well be its best angle, and while time has blunted the impact of its looks somewhat, it’s still not accurate to say they’ve grown on me. I vastly prefer the one after this, although sadly it wasn’t offered with this engine.

This last picture likely shows the actual reason it’s here, it suffered from hail damage, an increasingly common phenomenon here on the Front Range. The windshield is broken which was visible before, and there the moonroof is destroyed. Along with likely numerous dimples in the metal that are difficult to see on a dusty white car, coupled with the miles, this was likely claimed by the insurance company or the owner didn’t see it worthwhile to fix.

Given it looks to have been a well taken care of car, and if it really was totaled due to hail damage, I have to wonder how far it would have gotten if it didn’t get get caught in a storm. Of course, it could have been on its way out already, and the hail damage was the final nail in the coffin. Otherwise, if it was mine I would have been tempted to fix the glass and keep driving it.

I’ve had a 2001 Taurus SE. It went thru bean counters, as rear brakes no longer were of a disc variety, but at least it’s offered chrome plated interior door handles that were gone with a 2004 refresh. I’m surprised that even on top of the line SHO Ford didn’t bother to offer power reclining seat backs. Mine was the same and also had an iron block with aluminum heads that less than a year after changing coolant, had a brown one again and again.

Also in the last picture are clearly visible three generations of Ford Explorer.

I don’t know, Matt, you’re just trolling, right? I’m assuming people weren’t buying Corvettes and SHOs for their gas mileage, Ford has other Taurus models for those buyers. In regard to low displacements hurting Ford a much higher powered Taurus would have easily overwhelmed the FWD aspect of the car. GM’s FWD V8’s (W-body Impala SS) for example aren’t known for their driving dynamics, the chassis’ are overwhelmed with the 305hp and the weight of the engine.

The point of figuring out the HP/L is to show that the engine is hardly low on power as the original commenter seemed to imply. I’m no Ford engineer but assume that the engine bay couldn’t handle anything much bigger and wider than a 60 degree V8 as this one is, so they worked within the existing limitations for whatever reasons.

A 1999 Viper’s 450 hp makes the Corvette seem like weak sauce too until you bring the fact that it’s an 8liter engine into it. That’s 56HP/L. Piddly. The number of cylinders is less important than the overall displacement. But if it were a V8 and we were linear about it, then that’d be a 6.4L V8 and would produce 360hp which is in line with the Corvette.

Conversely if you upsized the SHO engine from 3.4l to oh, I don’t know, let’s go with 5.7l, then you end up with (again very crudely and linearly) 394hp. Then the focus would be why is the Corvette so tame. Yes I know that’s not an accurate way to figure it out but I’ve tired of this discussion…my original answer shows that the Taurus engine is hardly low on power. Circling back, higher power per unit of displacement usually uses more fuel if all other aspects (weight, gearing etc) were identical.

XR7Matt

Posted November 14, 2019 at 8:55 PM

I too have had this argument, I would bench race for hours waxing poetic about the Modular 4.6s volumetric efficiency compared to the LS1, despite losing almost every race against one. I grew tired of it too. HP/L is great to brag about on paper, but if the most volumetric efficient engine made is put into the wrong car it won’t win races, it will cost you more at the pump and will probably break at young age… like most of these 3.4 SHOs did.

The 3.4 Yamaha ‘engine’ isn’t low on power but the car itself – a premium package at a premium price – is. 235 horsepower was easily achievable on the old Yamaha V6 architecture, and the Duratec V6 architecture introduced in this very generation Taurus eventually exceeded it at 240 into the 2000s. There was no point creating a V8 for these if it wasn’t a powerhouse, torque steer be damned, this is why traditional SHO buyers shunned them, and why it didn’t win over any luxury oriented buyers clamoring for V8 smoothness in a Taurus.

I don’t mean to compare a Corvette to a Taurus SHO in demographics, I didn’t bring it up, but the weights of the chassis are comparable and the Taurus seems to even have a slight advantage in aero and in effect perfectly demonstrates the flaw in the “high HP/L is better, period” logic. The LS1 has enough displacement to effortlessly glide around 3400lbs of Corvette just off idle. The Yamaha 3.4 needs to be wrung out deep into its powerband regularly to get the 3400lbs of Taurus up to equivelant speed.

The Yamaha 3.4 is hands down the better engine than the LS1, the application of them however is what counts. The 3.4 would be great in a smaller/lighter car… but an engine of similar power with less cylinders would be even better. A crossplane V8 really has no purpose in life below 4 liters, that’s solidly six cylinder territory, why consume the additional mechanical losses of two extra cylinders?

Not that it really matters but the engine bay could likely handle a 90* V8, Lincoln used the transverse 260 horsepower modular 4.6 DOHC in the Continental based off the same platform. I quite frankly don’t know why this wasn’t used in the SHO other than to keep the Yamaha connection alive.

Great points, Savage! I agree, completely. The competition factor as the years wore on was a big point…….the ’89 SHO caught the industry off guard, but there’s only so long that will happen for before the rest of the carmakers want a piece of the pie. The other factor was probably price for value–when Ford had to up their game due to all the other manufacturers upping theirs, I’d imagine that had a big role in it, where there was some equity between high powered sedans….at least if one wanted to stay competitive with pricing within that market.

The other fairly bizarre thing about it is why they’d decide to do such a small V8. They should have just stuck with a 6, because a low displacement 8 won’t really have any torque advantages, and in manufacturing costs, that’s two more spark plugs and plug wires, pistons, rods, a costlier crankshaft and of course, more cam lobes and more valves and valve springs. More complexity for maintenance and repair, too. Why not just take the Duratec and beef that up? I guess it may be the exoticness of the Yamaha engine, but in truth, hardcore American power traditionalists are going to want to generally buy a big displacement engine anyways.

Considering that they didn’t offer a manual (more gears= more torque multiplication so that the car stays in the power band longer), more torque would have been the only way to really keep the car faster in real life driving and in the stoplight drags. Also, I don’t really understand the idea of sending the engines overseas and then having to send them back, which would have added a ton of costs to the overall bottom line.

Another thing that may have done the SHO in is, I suppose, if you consider that the average buyer of the original ’89 SHO would have been old enough where the 10 years that had elapsed had likely saw their kids completely grow up and or move out of the house, so there wasn’t really a need for a sedan anymore. The guys that bought these out of the need to have something sporty but practical had likely either bought the cars that they drove before that or had always wanted to drive (Camaros, Trans Ams, Mustangs, Corvettes etc). Personal luxury coupes were already largely dying off, and the missus wanting an SUV or minivan and wondering why you needed something fast and dangerous anyways, had likely won out.

69 HP/L for the Ford vs 60 HP/L for the Chevy. A 15% advantage for the Ford.
Not out of line. The smaller the engine the more help it needs from
tech such as multivalve DOHC etc. A bigger engine can get away with lower tech, as the current LS and Dodge Hemis show.
Addendum-Jim Klein beat me to it by seconds apparently.

Many of these were killed by the camshaft gears shearing off of the end. They were only press fit. Think of a Lifesaver candy pressed onto the end of Bic pen. When they let go, it was tantamount to a timing belt failure. The aftermarket came up with methods to A)pin the gear ..or .. B) the preferable solution.. weld them.
Poor showing for Yamaha. At least the original V6 was relatively bulletproof.

To make your lifesaver/Bic analogy accurate you need to explain that the Bic pen then had a ball forced through it that made the pen “swell” at the point that the lifesaver fits onto it. Called “swaging”, this made for a theoretical mechanical bond that in this case obviously wasn’t enough but it wasn’t simply a “press fit”.

Most of these failures occurred very early on, but even if it let go at 360k miles instead I think I’d be pretty pleased to have gotten to that point.

If you were to take the engine apart, I’d bet a bottle of the premium beverage of your choice that one of the above described procedures has been applied to it.
Also, swaging or no, it still seems like a fairly low-rent production method as opposed to a more positive fastening technique. Owners so afflicted with this issue were left to twist in the wind by Ford, even if the mileage was relatively low.

As Jim mentioned these did not have press fit cam sprockets. However press fit cam sprockets and gears have been successfully used for decades. The Chevy straight 6 from the 60’s and 70’s for example. A more modern example would be the 4.6l Windsor and 2v 5.4.

Speaking of 4.6 Fords the Romeo version uses a built up camshaft, one of the first use of the drawn ball method of expansion. However the built up camshaft had been around for a while at that point, Audi had some patents on it in the 80’s that used an expanding mandrel to lock the lobes in place. The 4.6 Romeo used a traditional slip fit sprocket retained by a bolt.

The use of a drawn ball swagged sprocket and lobes was not new to the SHO V-8 as it was used on the Duratec V-6 and those do not have the same problem.

One of the reasons that the built up camshaft is used is that it is a less expensive method of creating a low weight and precise camshaft with better torsional rigidity than cast cams.

The V6 SHO short blocks were assembled by Ford in the US and then went to Yamaha for final assembly. I believe it was done that way because that was the only way Yamaha would do it. They did the same thing with the Toyota 18RGU for example, though that engine didn’t have to take a trip around the world to do so.

I didnt know they did a V8 Taurus we only got the six, it wasnt popular I lived in OZ when it landed and the motoring press rubbished it they were rarely seen in traffic, there were seemingly more around in NZ when I came back very very cheap to buy compared to the equivalent Falcon but once bought almost impossible to get rid of as some aisian student neighbours discovered, theirs left via tow truck a few times but always returned now I see an Audi parked there and I havent seen the taurus for ages so success at last.

Nice find there and thanks for writing this rarer car up. Must have been a sight seeing this flying down the roads of Wyoming especially among all the trucks and SUVs. I see another Aerostar and LS have ended up there as well. Those Lincolns still look nice to this day.

I’m not sure if you noticed but these SHOs had a different and much more attractive front bumper than the standard Taurus – the upper grill opening was slightly larger and had an inset (color matched) bar with the Ford logo and the bottom grill was a continuous “smile.”
The regular Taurus for 96-97 had a small upper grill opening with the Ford logo above it and three separate openings as the lower grill which looks much more fish-like. As part of the 1998 refresh the standard Taurus got most of these enhancements which greatly improved the looks.

I considered this generation of SHO to be a sad ending for a car that was nearly magical when introduced just ten years earlier. While a good-driving, spirited large sedan, there was a notable lack of excitement in the car’s physical presence. Yawn. Too bad, because with a little bit of extra work, this still could have been a great car.

Incidentally, this is one of the few older cars where the rear seat is visibly worn. Looks like some tried to remove the rear seat cushion, but aside from that, the upholstery is discolored and used-looking. I’m thinking maybe the owner had dogs riding back there — or rowdy kids for 300,000 miles.

Yes, the SHO was big news when it came out. I recall accompanying two guys in my office, one a serial buyer of Fords, who went out at lunch to test drive one. His regular salesman was out and the guy we saw wouldn’t let him drive the car. My co-worker was HOT. I never did get a ride in an SHO.

Ford really screwed up by making this V8 SHO (something that should have been big news) so completely camouflaged on the road. Owners were probably not as happy with “yawn, nice white Taurus” when they were expecting “Wow, an SHO!”

I vividly remember the first 96 I ever saw. A secretary in our office was married to the son of a local Ford dealer. She drove one, very nicely optioned and in a beautiful cobalt blue color. I wasn’t sure I liked it, but figured that with the Taurus being one of the top selling cars on the road I would soon get used to it. I turned out to be wrong on both counts.

SHOs were always somewhat sleeper in appearance, the 89s even used the same basketweave wheels you could order on a LX. The second gen used Sable fenders and side markers but were otherwise pretty plain at first glance themselves. These were more like the late first generation plus models – different wheels, different front/rear bumpers with lower skirts and side skirts and a lip spoiler on the trunklid.

The SHO suffered luxury creep with this generation. Not that I’d say these were remotely luxurious, but the mandatory auto the smoother V8 and the wider plushier front seats were as luxury as a third generation Taurus got. The second generation largely carried over everything that was present on the performance oriented first generation, and only added the Auto/3.2 option as the lone luxury addition. The exterior kit was pretty nice though, I hated the styling of this generation Taurus but the SHO but despite the body changes being confined to lower body skirts they give it a less fishy presence, they had nice looking wheels too.

The gauges from this instrument cluster fit in 1997 Thunderbird’s and Cougars and we’re quite sought after in the clubs for some time, I pulled and sold probably 4 or 5 from these SHOs. Despite their rarity in production, they are not rare at junkyards, I’ve seen many more gen 3s than Gen 1 and 2s.

I was working at the local Ford dealer at the time these were still around. I started in late 1999 and there were still some of these on the lot brand new.

I know folks scoff at the low HP on them but these cars were pretty quick on the road and were pretty sneaky about it. They drove so smooth, you think you are doing 60 on the highway and look down and you are at 80mph

They were a nightmare (and i really mean nightmare) to do any work on it.

I find the SHO to be in the same category as the 94-96 Impala SS. A high power car that puts a smile on your face when you floor it but practical enough to use as a daily driver/family car.

Yes they were less powerful then a Vette, but you cannot use a vette as a daily driver with 2 kids.

I find in my older age, that i have mellowed in terms of the 3rd gen Taurus’s looks. They really don’t look that bad. The doors on the Taurus 96-99 sedan and the 00-07 sedan are the same and the doors, back door and also back bumper on the wagons are the same

STYLING: I owned a ’99 for 19 years, so perfectly happy with the styling. To each their own!

UNDERSTATED: Yeah, perhaps the SHO too subtly different from the regular model, but then I think of all the over-done performance models with overdone cladding, paint, stripes, and so on, and like this better.

FASCIA: The slightly-different front fascia has a special little following among the Taurus faithful—they like to find a boneyard SHO like this and put that fascia on their run-of-the-mill ’96-99.

360K MILES: WOW! Even if the cams got worked over, I’ll bet this was the original engine rather than a drop-in replacement that would be easy with a plentiful mill (and plenty of underhood room to work). “Highway miles or not,” that’s a devoted owner. Makes me wanna get hold of some SHO Owners Club and see if we can find out who Wyoming Owner was….

Yes, styling is highly subjective, and I certainly didn’t mean to come across as denigrating any owners that owned a Taurus of this generation, while I personally was not a fan of the design, I fully recognize that others hold different opinions and that works both ways, not everyone else likes what I like either.

And you are absolutely correct with plenty of other cars going for an over the top look for their “performance” model, which I generally abhor as well. I like subtle very much like Audi, BMW, and MB used to do 25 years ago (and don’t as much do anymore), this was perhaps a little TOO subtle inside and out.

Most folks thought the style was bizarre or downright ugly. The car looked so bad that Toyota’s 1997 Camry took the best selling crown away from the Taurus. Toyota could not outsell the Taurus with the best camry generation( 92-96) ever made and yet the 97 Camry (a thoroughly mediocre car itself) took the crown

The only car more odd looking those years was the 96-99 Sable (which looked like something heavy was dropped on the trunk and squished it.)

I mentioned that my feelings have mellowed on the 96-99 Taurus over the years. It does not look so odd anymore. But when being sold, most folks (including me) probably said “what the f is this?”

I often wondered why Ford spent the extra $$ for a new, low volume FWD compact V8. I know that Yamaha was involved with the original SHO, but was there a need to have the V8?

The new top dog engine was the regular Taurus was the 3.0 Duratec DOHC V6. What if Yamaha had just redesigned the heads on that for more performance. Looking at the base Vulcan V6 (140HP) to the Vulcan based SHO (220HP), I’m sure that Yamaha could have gotten the same 235HP or even more with that base.

Or, if Ford really wanted a V8 in the SHO why not go with the 4.6L Intech V8 that was offered in the platform mate Lincoln Continental? It was rated at 260HP in the Lincoln. There would have been money saved by the sharing of that engine, and that could have been used for a little bit more differentiation externally for the SHO.

I do tend to focus on the nicer or more interesting ones for this series, preferably both. There’s some that I pass on that are difficult to figure out what they even were at first glance, they generally wouldn’t interest us. And of course lots of just boring stuff, nobody is interested in a 2005 Sentra (yet). My guilty pleasure is finding a junkyard car that looks in vastly better shape than the street parked car we used for a Curbside Classic feature on it.

The better ones that you generally see here I’m guessing suffer from either (or in combination) – Emissions check failure, deceased relative with out of state heirs, low value/low desirabilility (stick shift 34yr old minivan with low back seats), hail damage/low value/high mileage, major internal mechanical issue etc. Overall mileages that I see average somewhere close to 200k so the cars are getting worn out.

And then not everyone has the patience or will to try to sell a car worth $1500 if that on a good day what with all the random people that might come to your door to haggle with you over said $1500 car.

Some are abandoned tow-aways, some are impounds, I saw an Equinox recently week with crime scene tape over all the doors/hatches (cut open of course), and a Focus with a neat row of bullet holes in the rear passenger door. I peeked inside and the holes went neatly through the inside of the door and then I couldn’t see where they ended up (no weird stains, thank goodness, although I have seen a few with biohazard stickers). Oh, and a Cadillac STS with an unfired bullet on the floor, looked like a .45. And lots are just low value cars that suffered a minor crash that made it uneconomical to fix and not possible to drive without fixing.

I saw a couple junking a 2000-2005 Taurus with less then 100,000 miles on it and it looked almost new. The car had a transmission that slipped/banged into 2 gear. The couple said the trans shop told them it needed a new trans and they junked it.

The sad part was the trans does not go bad on a lot of these, the OSS/Speed sensor dies and causes that(without the tell tail signs (non working speedo) )it is a $50 part and takes 10 mins to replace(it is on top of the trans and only needs one bolt removed)

Since you worked at a Ford dealership many years ago, I’m sure you’re familiar with the F150s that had the 300 inline-6 cylinder engine. I’m currently helping a friend install a new head on his ’88 F150 XL that has that very motor.

Compared to these V8 SHOs, working on a 300-equipped F150 is extremely simple – there’s basically nothing to it.

It wouldn’t surprise me is some of them could start up and drive away, with fluids and a battery.

I’m not sure about the places Jim hangs out at, but around here there are some yards that have contracts with the people who ask you to donate your car. Depending on the yard and state laws sometimes they will go out in the complete cars for sale area. If it doesn’t sell in X days then it gets processed and sat in the yard.

The original SHO was remarkable for several reasons. First, the car mags were still excited about the Taurus and its remarkable appearance and driving characteristics compared with its wheezy, flaccid Fairmont predecessors, GM whackback A cars which were good cars but outside of the 6000 STE were not that great to drive, and Chrysler’s inexpensive built for lunch ladies and the phone company K cars. The Accord drove well, but was too small for American families and the Camry was as exciting then as Camrys have always been. The car mags were even MORE excited about the SHO, which offered family sedan room and practicality plus substantial performance and sporty handling. The horsepower was truly remarkable for the time. The closest thing that existed at that time in a family priced, family sized sedan was the H body Bonneville; the Maxima was about to be reinvented as a 4 door sports car, and step away from nipponese button tufting and talking cars. Previously, the family man had to look forward to a flaccid, floaty, wheezy penalty box to schlep the family in comfort; with the SHO, here was a domestic sedan which didn’t have a lot of competition and was a real better idea versus Detroit’s typical paint and tape performance specials, or cars which offered genuine performance like the Thunderbird Turbo Coupe or Omni GLHS but peculiar execution. Considering that only 5 years before, Ford was offering limply restyled versions of wheezy Fairmonts, this was a HUGE leap forward.

Even if Boomer Dad couldn’t AFFORD a 1st Gen SHO or needed the Automatic for Mrs. Boomer, the SHO was a very nice halo car for Ford and kept the Taurus from seeming family-dowdy. The gen 1 SHO was really in a class by itself.

By the time 1999 rolled around, there was a LOT of competition, which was better in many ways. Various GM H and W bodies offered the Supercharged V6, which was nearly as powerful but robust and simple. The GM H and W bodies were better styled inside and out and probably less expensive. Without a whole lot of stretching, a buyer could consider an off lease Seville. The Maxima had a strong reputation, and the Camry and Accord had grown enough to be worthy competitors. Not with the same horsepower, but they had other advantages. The ovoid styling, price hikes, cheapness of the interior, and reputation for fragility did this car no favours.

A very good summary of this car’s failure in the marketplace. My mom’s close friend had one when new, a 1997 I believe, which had the camshaft failure not long out of warranty. Silver with chrome wheels. Young me thought it looked pretty neat, it certainly sounded neat, and was fairly rare, being a V8. It was pretty quickly traded off for a series of Camries, until a 2010 Fusion brought her back to Ford. She still has the Fusion.

A friend of mine’s dad had one of these, a white one like the subject, and all I could think of when my friend got on it entering the freeway was, “That’s it?”, and the dullness of everything. so boring. His dad only had it a few years and went through several cars he hated, until he got his last car, a 2010 Chrysler 300C, which he loved. He’s got Parkinson’s now and is close to the end, but he loved that 300, and my friend still has it. It’s held up very well over the 10 years it’s been around. The only issues were pothole caused suspension damage, and the stereo went ballistic a while back, making a noise kind of like a siren when playing a CD. A used one was cheap and the dealer actually didn’t rake my friend for putting it in. It was getting it’s pothole stuff fixed, so he made a killing already.

The first generation Taurus/Sable was a work of art. I owned a new ’87 Taurus wagon that was a near perfect car in so many ways. I had the car for 13 years, 130,000 trouble free miles. The oval design philosophy that was Ford’s forte in the ’90s was functional, but misused. I was never a fan of the extreme oval look, but it certainly looks no worse than many of those ridiculous, or shall I say hideous “origami” designs, with the giant gaping frowns that Toyota and Lexus have mired their vehicles with.

I had a ’95 SHO, last year of the second generation and of manual transmissions. It was a company car, and I liked it so well that I wouldn’t let the fleet manager take it at the 80,000 mile mark. I finally acquiesced and gave it up at over 120,000. The engine was even more impressive looking than the V8, with 12 of those sweet intake runners.

The third gen was quite a let down, which was one of the reasons I held on so long. Besides being ugly, it was a bore to drive vs mine. The buff mags panned it as well; I recall one of them referring to it as the “SLO”. (I finally replaced the SHO with an ’03 Maxima SE, 6MT.)

Since you were kind enough to provide the VIN, I took the liberty to obtain the CARFAX for this white unicorn. Appears this example had one owner who meticulously followed the manufacturer’s recommended service schedule. However, it seems 2011 was the last year this SHO appeared on the open road, having it’s last service visit at 356,559 miles. Where this SHO has been hiding for the past 8 years is one of great junkyard classic mysteries.